Does Word-Of-Mouth Change With the Passing of Time?

In this netnography, we extend WOM research beyond dyadic and static approaches. We investigate how group WOM interactions evolve over time as a result of the dynamic social nature of the communities in which they take place. In particular, we study how community development and relationship building influence WOM rhetoric. Our findings stem from a longitudinal ethnomethodological analysis of bulletin board discourse in a parenting website. From this analysis, we develop a typology of WOM interaction genres and show that they change over the community lifespan. Our findings confirm that the levels of social connection and the interaction communicative functions are the main factors that distinguish different WOM genres.